Death Penalty News

British consular incidents involving suspected ‘drug mules’ grew from 80 in 2023 to above 340 in 2025.  The number of British nationals detained overseas on drug trafficking charges has surged more than 4-fold over 3 years, official figures show, alongside a government warning that penalties include life imprisonment and the death sentence.  Consular incidents involving suspected "drug mules" grew from 80 in 2023 to above 340 in 2025, with at least 160 recorded so far this year.  Over 200 UK citizens are presently held in foreign custody for smuggling cannabis originating in Thailand. Around 60% of those caught since 2024 are aged between 16 and 30. 

A Dead Woman’s Sentence Is Commuted to Life in Prison. Justice or Farce? On July 8, England’s Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Secretary, David Lammy, informed his colleagues in the House of Commons that King Charles had granted a conditional pardon to a woman who was executed on July 13, 1955. The beneficiary of the King’s posthumous mercy was Ruth Ellis, who, as a report in the Guardian notes , “was the last woman to be hanged in the United Kingdom.”

Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be executed in the UK, has been granted a posthumous conditional pardon. Ellis was hanged at London's Holloway Prison in 1955 after being convicted of murdering her lover David Blakely. Her family have campaigned for her murder conviction to be overturned, arguing she was a victim of domestic abuse and was physically and emotionally abused by Blakely before shooting him. Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy told MPs the King had granted the pardon, saying that the death penalty had been replaced with a sentence of life imprisonment.

Brooke George from Gravesend, Kent, is accused of stabbing the man to death with a kitchen knife after they met on Facebook Brooke George, 23, from Gravesend, Kent is accused of killing a fellow Brit with a kitchen knife. According to campaign group Detained in Dubai, George stabbed him to death in an act of self defence. Radha Stirling, CEO of Detained in Dubai, said: “She reached for a knife after being attacked. Authorities must treat her as a domestic violence survivor while they investigate.”

DENPASAR – Two British men were given lengthy jail terms on Feb 26 by an Indonesian court after being found guilty of smuggling cocaine into the popular holiday island of Bali. Kial Garth Robinson was sentenced to 11 years, while Piran Ezra Wilkinson landed a term of nine years. Both were also ordered to pay a fine of around US$60,000 (S$75,804) or serve an additional 190 days. Robinson, 29, was arrested in September 2025 at Ngurah Rai International Airport after an officer found two packages containing 1.3kg of cocaine in his backpack.

A trio of British drug mules who tried to smuggle £300,000 (US$405,000, €345,000) worth of cocaine into Bali are reportedly set to be deported back to the UK after missing out on the death penalty. Lisa Stocker, 39, a mother-of-three, was arrested with her partner Jonathan Collyer, 39, back in February. She was stopped after a routine X-ray of their luggage detected 17 packets of the dessert Angel Delight that had been stuffed with nearly a kilogram of cocaine. 

For years, there was a broad consensus in Israel that there was no benefit to reintroducing the death penalty. But now, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is reportedly considering supporting a bill which would bring back capital punishment for convicted terrorists. The bill, which has passed its first reading in the Knesset, would introduce the death penalty for those who murder Jews – specifically, Palestinian terrorists. It would not apply to Jews who commit acts of terrorism and murder Palestinians. And it would not apply if Israeli Arabs, who are full citizens, are murdered.

Two British drug convicts, including a grandmother who had been on death row in Indonesia for more than a decade, arrived back in the UK on Friday. Indonesia has some of the world's toughest drug laws, but has moved to release more than half a dozen high-profile detainees in the last year. Lindsay Sandiford, 69, was sentenced to death on the tourist island of Bali in 2013 for smuggling $2.14 million worth of cocaine into Indonesia. She was released on humanitarian grounds along with Shahab Shahabadi, 36, who had been serving a life sentence for drug offences after his arrest in 2014.

Lindsay Sandiford, 69, will be handed a UK-funded seat on a flight leaving Bali this afternoon. She was sentenced to death in 2013 after being caught smuggling £1.6million of cocaine into Indonesia. The 69-year-old pensioner has been granted a UK-funded seat on a flight leaving Bali this afternoon. The legal secretary, who was sentenced to death in 2013, will have a brief layover before landing at London Heathrow Airport following a 20-hour journey. This marks the end of a distressing period for Sandiford, during which she spent 13 years awaiting execution for smuggling £1.6million worth of cocaine into Indonesia.

The family of Ruth Ellis, from Rhyl, said she was a victim of domestic abuse that was let down by the criminal justice system and the impact of her execution had been 'devastating for her family' The grandchildren of the last woman to be hanged in Britain are seeking a posthumous pardon, saying she was physically and emotionally abused by her partner before killing him.  Ruth Ellis, a nightclub hostess from Rhyl, was executed on July 13, 1955, at Holloway Prison after being convicted of murdering her lover, David Blakely.

The British national, 69, could be free to return home following an agreement between Indonesia and the UK A British grandmother who was facing a death sentence in Bali for smuggling a large haul of cocaine into the island will be freed, more than a decade after her arrest. Lindsay Sandiford, 69, is currently being held in the notorious Kerobokan prison, which holds around 1,000 inmates. Sandiford, from Redcar in Teesside, could be free to return home as soon as Tuesday after an Indonesian government source told AFP that an agreement had been reached with the UK government.

George Wilson, 23, from High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, is said to have received 9.15kg of methamphetamine from another Briton at a hotel in the red-light area of Bangkok on Monday evening. But vice squad cops are said to have been tipped off about the movements of the drugs gang. Officers swooped on the hotel room at Le Fenix on Sukhumvit Soi 11 and arrested George. In the arrest video, George was heard telling police he had been in Thailand for 'two weeks'. When asked what is in the bag, he says 'I don't know'.

Three British drug smugglers have been spared the death penalty in Indonesia, but experts reveal that the conditions they will face whilst serving their sentences will be hard to endure Three British drug mules have been sentenced to one year in prison after being caught smuggling over 900 grams of cocaine into Indonesia. At first, it was feared that all three could face the death penalty after coming afoul of the country's strict anti-drug laws. However, Lisa Stocker, 39, her partner, Jon Collyer, 39, and accomplice Phineas Float, 31, were spared this fate - and could be back in the UK relatively soon after finishing their prison sentences.

Three Britons who faced the death penalty in Bali for allegedly smuggling £300,000 worth of cocaine have been spared. Lisa Stocker, 39, a mum-of-three, and her partner, Jon Collyer, 39, had travelled from the UK via Qatar and were stopped in Indonesia's capital after a routine airport x-ray detected suspicious items, namely 17 packages of cocaine totalling around 994g. The couple first appeared in court on February 3 alongside Phineas Float, 31, who was accused of receiving the packages at an airport hotel. Under Indonesia’s strict drug laws, the trio could have faced the death penalty after being accused of violating Article 131 of Indonesian Narcotic law.

A British mother-of-three facing the death penalty for allegedly smuggling £300k-worth of cocaine into Bali via Angel Delight sachets broke down in tears as she told a judge she was conned into trafficking the drug. Lisa Stocker, 39, told the court she "won't trust people so easily again" as she broke down in tears during a hearing on Tuesday. The mother-of-three said she had no idea the 17 Angel Delight dessert sachets she was told to bring into Indonesia by a friend actually contained 992 mg of cocaine.

The mum-of-three insists the packages "were not mine". A British mum facing the death penalty in Bali for allegedly smuggling cocaine in packets of Angel Delight insists she was “framed”. Lisa Stocker says she was the victim of a stitch-up after authorities claimed she entered the Indonesian island with £300,000 worth of narcotics disguised as the popular dessert. Ms Stocker told Denpasar Central Court: "The packages were not mine, but someone else's," adding: "I was framed.” Stocker and her partner Jon Collyer, both 39 and from East Sussex, were arrested at Denpasar International Airport in Bali on Sunday, February 1.

Three British nationals accused of smuggling over two pounds of cocaine into Indonesia were charged Tuesday in a court on the tourist island of Bali. They face the death penalty under the country's strict drug laws. Convicted drug smugglers in Indonesia are sometimes executed by firing squad. Jonathan Christopher Collyer, 28, and Lisa Ellen Stocker, 29, were arrested on Feb. 1 after customs officers halted them at the X-ray machine after finding suspicious items in their luggage disguised as food packages, said prosecutor I Made Dipa Umbara.

A court on the Indonesian tourist island of Bali has sentenced a British man to 10 months in jail for drug offences after a charge that could carry the death penalty was dropped. Thomas Parker, from Cumbria, was arrested on January 21 at a villa near Kuta beach, a popular tourist spot, after he allegedly collected a package containing drugs from a motorcycle taxi driver on a nearby street. Police officers said Parker was "acting suspiciously" when he collected the package, according to the court document. He allegedly discarded it in a panic and fled when police approached him. He was traced back to the villa where he was staying and arrested.

WARNING: DISTRESSING CONTENT The practice of execution has been around since the days of ancient civilisations, and, as uncomfortable as it may be to think about, this punishment is still handed out in various countries around the world today. Capital punishment for murder was suspended in the UK as recently as 1965, within living memory.  Peter Anthony Allen and Gwynne Owen Evans became the last prisoners to be executed on British soil on August 13, 1964, with the pair hanged at separate prisons in Manchester and Liverpool for the murder of John Alan West. Since then, there have been frequent calls to bring back the death penalty, which some supporters believe to be an effective deterrent against the most despicable crimes. Those on the other side of the debate believe capital punishment to be an inhumane measure, often citing the numerous instances where convicts have faced agonising deaths.

Lindsay Sandiford, 68, reportedly shared 'cuddles and kisses' with her loved ones for the first time in years A British grandmother who has been stuck on death row in Bali for more than a decade has been reunited with her loved ones for the first time in years. Lindsay Sandiford has been locked up in Indonesia's notorious Kerobokan Prison since 2013 after being found guilty of trying to smuggle £1.6million of cocaine into the country.